


I Am the One

by SuchStuffAsDreamsAreMadeOn



Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016), Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: Rebellion Era - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Angst, Blood, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, F/M, Hoth, Hurt/Comfort, Lots of Angst, More Chapters to Come, More Tags to Coome, My rating is on the safe side, Nightmares, Post-Battle of Scarif, Psychological Torture, Slow Burn, Syringes/needles, Torture, yes it's BOTH
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-06
Updated: 2018-01-02
Packaged: 2019-02-11 04:03:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,990
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12927006
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SuchStuffAsDreamsAreMadeOn/pseuds/SuchStuffAsDreamsAreMadeOn
Summary: "Her right hip bore the scar of a blaster bolt that had been meant for him, her eyes often bore the dark circles of sleepless nights spent comforting him, and her heart bore the aches and worries of a woman in love in the midst of war.  Jyn chose to sacrifice herself for the Alliance, for friends, and for strangers.  And somehow, Jyn chose to sacrifice herself for Cassian, despite the blood that dripped from his memories into his nightmares.  It had seeped into every corner of his life, Cassian had thought, until the day Jyn had wiped away a space for herself and chosen to sacrifice her heart for his.And he knew, with a clarity that sat deep in his soul, that she would chose to sacrifice herself for him again and again and again.  He would do the same for her."Cassian and Jyn are discovered while on a mission.





	1. I Am the One Who Knows You

**Author's Note:**

> I am the one who knows you,  
> I am the one who cares,  
> I am the one who's always been there.  
> I am the one who's helped you,  
> And if you think that  
> I just don't give a damn,  
> Then you just don't know who I am.

Cassian’s knees hit rough stone as a strong hand shoved him to the ground. The room was dark, the warm flickering light of the few lamps not nearly bright enough to reach into the corners of the cave. Parts of the underground lair had been made comfortable, rugs and fabrics draped over a natural made dais where a raised chair sat surrounded by pillows and cushions, but the stones beneath Cassian had been left bair. If the Bachda cult Cassina and Jyn had been assigned to infiltrate had a throne room, this would be it.

A furious yelp was heard, then a small and struggling body was forced down next to Cassian. Jyn stilled when her eyes met his. So much for any hope he may have had of her cover remaining intact. They had been so careful, entering the syndicut separately, each bringing honored gifts for the Enforcers to deliver to the Hutts. Since the Bachda clut was a front for the Hutts, run by a select group of Nikto on Kintan, staying in the Hutts good graces had been paramount to the success of their mission. Rebellion shipments had already been hit by the Bachda cult three times in the past two months, draining the Alliance of much needed supplies. Jyn and Cassina had been tasked with discovering how the information could have been leaked. Cassian feared that whoever the informant was had been made aware of their presence before they could become aware of theirs. 

A blaster pressed into the nape of Cassian’s neck and out of the corner of his eye he could see another trained on Jyn, but Cassian allowed himself one more moment to look into the green of the eyes staring back at him. 

Force, he had missed her.

Aside from a few quick, whispered words and messages detailing their total lack of their findings, they had not been able to see or interact with each other much at all during this mission. How could they, when their aliases didn’t know each other?

A sound made Jyn’s eyes flick to the throne and Cassian’s gaze reluctantly follow. The chair was occupied by a Kajain’sa’Nikto, red skin tones cast a shade darker in the half light. Lethrol, Hutt appointed leader of the Bachdas, had arrived. He stared down at them coldly, but there was a fierce glint in his eye that made Cassian’s stomach clench. Lethrol did not take well to being crossed. Cassian sent a silent prayer to the Force, or whoever was listening, that the extraction message he had sent moments before being dragged away would reach Kay soon. 

At a short nod from the Nikto, a sharp burst of pain flashed through Cassian’s skull as he was hit over the head with his captor’s blaster. He doubled over, guessing from Jyn’s bit off cry that she had received the same treatment. 

“Even spies must show me some respect.” Lethrol’s Basic was clipped and when Cassian glanced back he saw what he had only begun to identify in the Nikto’s eyes now written across his entire face. He was going to enjoy this. 

“We won’t tell you anything, you son of a Bantha,” Jyn spat. Lethrol stood, stepping down to stand just in front of Jyn, a terrifying smile still playing on his face. It was all Cassina could do not to fling himself at Lethrol for even looking at Jyn the way he did.

“You misunderstand, my dear,” Lethrol purred, the sweetness of his tone threatening to drown the two of them. “I have no need of your information, I have plenty of my own. I know who you work for and I know why you are here. I just want to have some fun.”

The touch of a force pike to his back sent electric shocks coursing through Cassian’s body. A sound escaped him, but the echoing of Jyn’s cries hurt Cassian more than any shock ever could. When the pain abated and the light behind his eyes faded, Cassian looked back up at Lethrol, smiling down at the two of them.

The Nikto knelt next to Jyn as she gasped for breath on the floor next to Cassian.

“Now, my dears, I’m sorry to say this, but we’re really only equipped to handle one prisoner at a time. We don’t often get the fun of two people to, uh, educate. One of you is going to have to wait your turn.”

Another shock left both Cassian and Jyn shaking on the floor. Lethrol gripped Jyn’s chin, forcing her to look up at him from where she lay. Cassian wouldn’t have been surprised if every Nikto in the room could hear him grinding his teeth together with the effort of not attacking Lethrol. He was disarmed and still panting at the effects of the force pike. He would be no good to Jyn dead.

“So, which one of you would like to go first?”

“I will,” Cassian spat, trying not to sound too desperate. If he could spare Jyn even an ounce of pain he would, no matter what it may cost him. He knew that the only reason his words came out faster than Jyn’s was because Lethrol’s fingers on her cheek seem to have momentarily paralyzed her. 

Two sets of eyes flicked to him, one wide and fearful, the other narrow and curious.

“Will you, now? That’s very generous of you.” Lethrol turned his attention back to Jyn, his long fingers still stroking her skin. It made Cassian want to be sick. “Isn’t that kind of him, my dear. To offer to endure all that pain. I wonder what would make him do that?”

Jyn’s fire flared and she slapped his hand away from her face. “Leave him alone you-” The tip of the force pike came down on Jyn’s shoulder before she could finish speaking. She cried out, her body seizing, and Cassian felt pain course through him, despite his guard not having made a single move towards him. 

“Stop it! Stop it!” At a nod from Lethrol, Jyn’s guard stepped back, leaving her gasping. “You asked, and I offered to go first. I offered! Leave her be.”

“Cassian, no.” Jyn’s voice was weak but she pushed herself up again, her eyes meeting his.

The glint in the Nikto lord’s look had returned, and Cassian could find no better description for it than malevolent glee. “Do you care for this girl, Cassian?” The name slid off his tongue like an insult. Cassian would never forgive himself for it, but somehow - even after years of intelligence training - he couldn't stop his glance from slipping, for the briefest of moments, to Jyn. It was enough. Lethrol let out a laugh as if High Day had come early. The sound made Cassian shiver.

“You do. Don’t you? Well don’t worry, Cassian, I’ll let you go first. In fact, I have something very special for you, something I’ve always wanted to try. You are the first to give me the opportunity. I thank you for it.” With that Lethrol stood up, barking orders Cassian couldn’t understand. 

Two guards dragged Cassian to the side of the dais, forcing him to the ground and hitting him with their force pikes again for good measure. When the shocks and the pain subsided Cassian watched in horror as Jyn was stirpped of her outer layers of clothing. Her hands were bound and attached to a chain, which was then hoisted through a metal ring attached to the ceiling specifically, Cassian imagined, for that purpose.

Jyn gasped as her arms were forced above her head. Her feet still touched the ground, but only barely. 

It took everything in Cassian’s power to keep his voice even. “We made a deal, Lethrol.”

The spiked head turned to him and the smile Lethrol flashed was full of sharp teeth. “Don’t worry, Rebel. I have the distinct feeling that no matter what I do to her it will hurt you more.” Cassian felt as though he had eaten some of Chewbacca’s cooking. It was probably good that he had not eaten lunch. The sight of Lethrol running a cold finger down Jyn’s bare arm turned Cassian’s vision red.

“Emotional pain has always fascinated me. How much you are willing to give for another seems to me a measure of weakness.” He glanced back at Cassian. “You’ll have to be sure to tell me your thoughts before I kill you. Now, my dear,” he purred, turning back to Jyn. “Have you ever heard of Skirtopanol?”

While the others in the room might not have been able to see the fear behind Jyn’s fierce eyes, Cassian could read her well enough to perceive the recognition the name brought to her. Of course she would know Skirtopanol. Between her time with Saw, her life on the run, and her experience with Imperial labor camps, the torture drugs of the galaxy were nothing new to her. This particular drug was a truth serum, but beings like Lethrol found the pain enhancing properties of the compound more useful. The greater sensitivity made the torture more effective. Once injected with Skirtopanol, the softest cloth would be painful as needles on the skin, and needles - well, Cassian couldn’t bear to think.

The dim lamp light caught the glint of a syringe just before the needle slipped into Jyn’s arm. She screamed as the blue-grey liquid pulsed into her body, the effects of the drug all but instantaneous. 

Lethrol tutted and turned back to Cassian. “Oh dear. That was quite a high dose for such a little body.” A cart was brought forward, the array of torture implements laid out singing in the light. Carefully Lethrol selected a knife the length of his palm. “Which means, if I do this,” with a quick motion the knife flashed across Jyn’s arm, a thick line of red following in its path, “well I can’t quite imagine how much that must hurt her. Can you?”

Jyn was gasping. Though Cassian could tell the cut wasn’t all that deep - Jyn had certainly had much worse - the force of her shuddering body shook the chains dangling from the ceiling. Another flash of the knife and blood spilled from Jyn’s side. A cry escaped her and she whimpered as her eyes found Cassian’s once more. 

“Can you tell me how that feels, my dear?”

“I’m going to rip your ugly skin from your bones,” Jyn gasped.

Even as the knife bit into Jyn’s skin once again Cassian felt a tiny swell of pride. Jyn would not be so easily broken.

“Well that won’t do at all. But don’t worry,” Lethrol turned his sickening smile to Cassian, “the Skirtopanol in her system won’t wear off for hours yet. We have plenty of time to get creative.”

Without a thought Cassian lunged at the Nikto. The electric shock of the force pike hit him before he could take three steps and left him seizing on the ground. Lethrol stood above him, then knelt, so that when the electricity abated Cassian was able to push himself up and look the crime lord in the eyes.

The Lethrol's voice was quiet when he spoke, but his fury was evident. “You will watch her scream, and if you try to help her it will be your hand that causes her death.” The threat was punctuated with a flick of the knife. Warm blood seeped down Cassian’s ribs, the cut long, but not deep enough for him to bleed out before Lethrol had his way with him. 

With that Lethrol turned back to Jyn and began his work in earnest. He pressed his knife into her body once more, drawing it through her skin slowly this time, as if he were savoring every note of Jyn’s painting, broken scream and every drop of her crimson blood. Jyn thrashed and bucked away, but chained and drugged, with every fiber of her being vibrating in pain, she had nowhere she could go. Lethrol’s laughter mixed with Jyn’s draw out cries as Cassian realized with mind-numbing horror that he hadn’t even begun to see the worst of it. 

The minutes dragged into hours as Cassian was forced to watch, helpless, as Jyn shrieked and sobbed under the Nikto’s tools. Lethrol seemed to prefer electric implaments of torture, the blue and green shocks that corsed through Jyn leaving no outward marks, but sending convulsions coursing through her body. Sometimes she screamed his name, other times she hung limp, her mind and body taxed to the limit, eyes glazed over. 

At some point Cassian must have gone into shock. He remembered only bits and pieces, as if it had been he, and not Jyn, who had been drugged. Occasionally the guard standing behind him would prod him with the force pike for good measure, whether to amuse himself or bring Cassian back to the present he was never quite sure. Somehow Cassian came to welcome the physical pain. At least for a moment it would allow him to concentrate on something - anything - other than Jyn.

She shrieked her voice hoarse and the tears on Jyn and Cassian’s cheeks alike dried to salty streaks when exhaustion and horror left them each too weak to even cry. 

Sometimes Cassian found a near constant string of words grinding out from behind his clenched teeth, their meanings all but incoherent to him. Pleas to the Force and pleas to Jyn mixed in equal measure with Festian curses and Chirrut’s prayers. 

Other times he fell silent, his mind blocking out all but the smallest of things. The soft glow of Jyn’s Kyber crystal hanging around her neck, smudged slightly with her blood. The way her tears amplified the green in her beautiful eyes. The pulse of her heartbeat that pounded in her neck, in the place he loved to kiss when they were curled quietly together in their bunk.

Lethrol was careful to keep Jyn conscious through it all, but shrieks and screams morphed to cires, then whimpers and moans, and finally she hung silent, her legs no longer able to support her body, her neck no longer able to lift her head. Finally, when even the touch of the force pike couldn’t break Jyn’s deafening quiet, Lethrol turned away. 

“Let her down.”

The order was followed immediately, the chain around Jyn’s wrist released. She sank to her knees, her figure shaking. Cassian wasn’t even sure she was aware of anyone else in the room.

She had been losing blood steadily since this nightmare began. The blood loss must be getting to her at this point and for a moment Cassian dared to hope that they would allow Jyn to bandage her wounds, that they would turn their attentions towards him, leave Jyn alone, even if it was just so she could gather her strength for the next round of torture. Anything so long as they stopped hurting her. 

“Jyn.”

Even to his own ears Cassian sounded beyond broken. His voice was husky and he could taste copper from where he had bit his cheek, but somehow, despite everything, it was enough to make her look up.

Jyn’s eyes met his, the same eyes that had been his lifeline at Scarif, that blazed with fire on missions, and that blinked sleepily up at him in the early morning pre-light. Her gaze was slightly unfocused, but despite the trembling and the low moan of pain that escaped her lips, relief flooded through Cassian, however short lived. 

Lethrol had turned away for a moment - fiddling with something on the cart filled with instruments just the sight of which sent Cassian’s mind reeling back to Jyn’s screams - but now he crossed back to Jyn, another small syringe in his red hand. A shudder ran through Cassian at the sight. 

“Very well done, my dear,” Lethrol’s voice was soft and sickly sweet. “Most humans wouldn’t have lasted half as long as you did. And Cassian,” the Nikto’s red eyes slid to the spy, “you were most interesting. How must it feel to be rendered so helpless by the pain of another. What weakness that must be.”

“I swear to the Force I will rip your limbs from you body, you -” the touch of the force pike stopped Cassian’s words. On their lowest setting the pikes we quite an effective means of torture. On their highest they could kill a human with one touch. Cassian suspected the Nikto guards had been slowly increasing the voltage. 

“Well, it seems we have proven Cassian’s feelings for you.” Cassian watched as the crime lord knelt once again by Jyn - his brave, fearless Jyn - and she shrank back from him in terror. She was well and truly broken and what was left of Cassian shattered at the sight of it. 

“Now I think it’s your turn to prove yourself, my dear. This,” Lethrol told her, holding up the syringe, “is Lotiramine.”

Confusion washed over Cassian. Lothiramine was a benign drug used to mask the symptoms of Blastonecrosis, a particularly deadly disease. What Lethrol wanted with it was beyond him.

“Lotiramine is harmless by itself,” Lethrol explained, “helpful, even, in the right circumstances. This supply was recovered in one of your Alliance shipments. However, when paired with certain amounts of Skirtopanol - for example, the amount pumping through your body right now - it metabolizes and, in most instances, becomes lethal.”

The Nikto placed the syringe on the ground next to Jyn then stood, a smug smile on his face. “You will injected yourself with it,” he instructed her.

Cassian flinched back at the suggestion, but Jyn just let out a harsh breath. It was the closest she could come to a laugh. 

Swaying on her knees, her voice raw from screaming, Jyn still managed to speak. “Never.”

Lethrol shook his head, pacing away from Jyn. “Ah, my dear. Don’t make oaths you can’t keep.”

In a moment the crime lord had grabbed Cassian, hauling him upright and pinning his arms behind his back. The flash of a knife was at his throat and Cassian froze, years of Alliance training keeping him still despite the pounding of his heart at the sight of the syringe lying by Jyn’s kneeling form.

“Inject yourself or he dies, here and now.”

Jyn’s eyes widened slowly as Lethrol’s words reached her through the haze of pain, and they slid between the two of them.

“Jyn, don’t.” Cassian’s voice was rough but firm. The press of the knife at his throat silenced the rest of his words. Don’t you dare, Jyn. Not ever. Not for me.

When they had met he had counted her as nothing more than a thief. A criminal who would stab him in the back the first chance she got, who didn’t care about anything or anyone other than herself. A firefight and a young girl on a street in Jedah had proved him wrong. Without a second thought for herself she had run into blaster fire, despite Cassian’s shouts, and had carried the girl to safety. He had thought in that moment that Jyn was what the Rebellion could be - should be - far more than he ever was. He looked down a scope and pulled the trigger so that others didn’t have to. It was a necessary job, but one that took a part of him with each new mission, never to be regained, and made him both a necessity to and an outsider from the Rebellion he had given so much for. And, above all, it had made him unworthy of saving.

But that didn’t seem to matter to Jyn.

Her right hip bore the scar of a blaster bolt that had been meant for him, her eyes often bore the dark circles of sleepless nights spent comforting him, and her heart bore the aches and worries of a woman in love in the midst of war. Jyn chose to sacrifice herself for the Alliance, for friends, and for strangers. And somehow, Jyn chose to sacrifice herself for Cassian, despite the blood that dripped from his memories into his nightmares. It had seeped into every corner of his life, Cassian had thought, until the day Jyn had wiped away a space for herself and chosen to sacrifice her heart for his.

And he knew, with a clarity that sat deep in his soul, that she would chose to sacrifice herself for him again and again and again. He would do the same for her.

“I will kill him, my dear. It’s your choice.”

A tiny stream of blood dripped down Cassian’s throat. He prayed that Jyn could read his thoughts in his eyes. _Kay his coming. He’ll be here soon. Don’t do this. I will never forgive myself if you do this._

Horror was plain on Jyn’s face and the entire room was still. The torture had taxed her, body and mind, to the limit, and her entire frame still shook with the aftermath of it, right down to her pale, thin fingers as they reached down and picked up the syringe. Her breath caught and her gaze found Cassian’s once more.

“One of you is about to die.” Lethrol’s voice had lost its sweetness, his anger bleeding through. “Make your choice!” With his final shout, Lethrol plunged his short dagger down.

Cassian gasped at the agony that sparked through his body even as Lethrol released the knife, leaving it embedded in Cassian’s side. Any noise Cassian made, however, was drowned out by Jyn’s scream.

“No! No, please! Please, don’t.” The last word ended in a sob. “I’ll do it.” Her voice broke and her chest shuttered, but when her eyes met Cassians’ they were calm. “I’ll do it,” she repeated, before turning to the death she held in her hand. 

Shaking his head, Cassian would have sunk to the ground, unable to support himself, if not for the strong arms holding him still. Jyn positioned the needle against the soft skin in the crook of her elbow, hands trembling. 

“Jyn, don’t!”

Cassian struggled, desperate and frantic, against his captor’s hold. 

Jyn closed her eyes and took a breath-

“No! Jyn, no!” 

-then plunged the needle into her skin.

She screamed as the drug entered her bloodstream. Cassian’s own screams echoed hers.

Later, when Cassian tried to remember what happened next, he found that panic - a sheer, white light - had blocked out most of his memories. He escaped, or perhaps was released, from Lethrol’s hold and stumbled to Jyn, the pain the knife still buried in his side must be causing him not even registering. 

Her body contorted and she crumpled towards the floor, still screaming, as the poison did its work. She retched and convulsed, her body trying to fight what could not be fought. Cassian caught her head before it hit the ground and gathered her up in his arms as her screams continued, breaking only to be replaced with cries and heaving moans. Her chest contracted, then released and contacted again, her slight frame seizing so violently Cassian could hardly hold her.

The sight of Jyn writhing in agony, her eyes unseeing, undid Cassian. She thrashed against his grip, trying to escape the pain that was inside her, but he restrained her as best he could, afraid that she would hurt herself more than had already been done to her.

“Jyn. Jyn! Look at me! Look. You’re going to be alright. I promise,” Cassian gasped, holding her tightly, trying to keep her still. He pushed the hair out of her face, his motions frantic as if these simple acts could keep her from leaving him. Some part of him knew that she couldn’t hear him, that she was already beyond his reach, but the pleas slipped from his mouth nonetheless. 

“Jyn, don’t go. Stay with me.” His voice broke and her fingers spasmed as they found his. He gripped her hand tightly. 

She had gone quiet but she continued to jerk in his grip. Her jaw was clenched, every line in her neck standing out in sharp relief, and her gaze were far away. It took Cassian a moment to realize that the wrenching sobs he could hear echoing through the cave were his own. 

Suddenly, Jyn’s back arched as she let out one final scream that seemed to last forever, then her eyes rolled back and fluttered closed. Her body collapsed and went lip in Cassian’s arms, her head lolling over his arm, her still frame cradled to his chest.

For a moment everything was motionless. The only things Cassian could hear were his pounding heartbeat and his harsh breath. He didn’t blink, he didn’t move, he didn’t think. 

“Well that was most interesting.”

The voice broke both the silence and Cassian. With slow and gentle movements Cassian lowered Jyn to the ground. Lithrol might still have been speaking, Cassian couldn’t make anything out past the roaring in his ears, but he decided he didn’t much care. A rage, fueled by anguish and despair worse than anything Cassian had felt possible, had taken hold of him. This was beyond what had prompted him to join the Alliance, beyond what he had felt when his parents had died, beyond even comprehension itself.

With a quick jerk Cassian yanked the knife from his side. He might bleed out faster this way, but not fast enough. And now Cassian had a weapon. He intended to use it.

The guard closest to him was first. A quick slash across the neck despatched him, the Niktos’ anatomy similar enough to that of a human’s. His own guard was next, and as he collapsed before him Cassian grabbed the force pike from his hand. A blaster bolt found Cassian’s shoulder before the owner of the pistol hit the ground, the knife sticking out of his chest. Two guards remained, but without a thought Cassian turned his attentions to Lithrol.

Cassian had always preferred blasters. He was a sniper and a spy, afterall, and while he had trained extensively in most types of combat with the Rebellion he had always gravitated towards blasters. But now Cassian stalked past the guards’ fallen pistols as he stepped towards Lithrol, a quick flick of his thumb adjusting the force pike in his hand to its highest setting. 

The Nikto fought back, a small blaster in his hand, but Cassian dogged two bolts and barely felt the third. And then he was there, and when, a moment later, Baze, Chirrut, and Kay burst into the room, quickly taking out the two remaining guards, Lethrol was already dead, the force pike buried in his chest. 

Hardly registering his friend’s presence Cassian stumbled back to Jyn. He ignored Baze’s worried exclamations and Kay’s information that when Cassian and Jyn hadn’t responded to their pre-extraction check in with Command a rescue team had been dispatched to bring the two of them home, the words slipping through his unregistering mind.

He collapsed to his knees by Jyn’s side, shaking hands, now covered in blood, hovering, unable to touch her. He could feel himself trembling, his vision tinting dark around the edges, but he didn’t look up from Jyn, didn’t move or even acknowledged the others’ presence. 

Silence filled the room, pressing in around him, - choking his lungs, filling his mind - until Chirrut’s voice, somehow both hard and soft, was heard in the room for the first time. 

“Cassian, she isn’t dead.” 

*****

After three days Cassian was convinced that the beeping would drive him insane. It was constant, incessant, filling the entirety of the small medbay room. The only thing worse than the beeping was the two times the beeping had stopped, once on the nightmarish flight away from Kintan and once just after they got back to Hoth. 

He had carried Jyn’s limp body back to the ship – Kay, Chirrut, and Baze tried to argue he wasn’t strong enough after what he’d been through, but eventually gave up and covered his back – where a medical officer and droid had accompanied the extraction team. Even still, her heart had stuttered to a halt twice, the poison fighting to do its job. The sight of her convulsing under the electric shocks of the doctor’s instruments had almost been too much for Cassian, the memories of her screams still so fresh in his mind. 

Cassian had collapsed next to Jyn - hardly noticing as Bodhi piloted them into hyperspace and Baze worriedly slapped Bacta patches onto Cassian’s own wounds - and he had stayed by her side every moment since, fighting off everyone from medical droids to Mon Mothma. He hadn’t had to fend off anyone recently and he had a distinct feeling that Kay was keeping guard outside the door, not allowing anyone inside. 

It had been three days. Three days and Jyn hadn’t woken up. Three days and no one seemed able to tell Cassian if she would wake up. All he had been told was that it was very rare for someone to survive the combination of Lotiramine and Skirtopanol and that even in the few documented cases of it happening, serious damage had always been done. Bodhi had been in the room with him when the news had been delivered, and as much as Cassian loved the pilot, the hopeless sadness on Bodhi’s face had made Cassian want to scream. 

This was Jyn. His Jyn. She was strong. She would pull through. 

But after three days the inescapable terror that, after everything, Cassian would still lose her, that she would slip away quietly, laying tiny and fragile in a medbay bed, and that he would never get her back, threatened to choke Cassian.

He shifted in his seat, his knife wound still twinging a bit under the bandages. Somewhere in medbay was a bed assigned to him, but they had only tried to make him leave once. After his reaction the first time he doubted they would try again. 

He was dozing when the beeping shifted. The change in the monotonous sound he had become so accustomed to started Cassian alert. A moment later a near-human medical officer, followed closely by a 2-1B droid, hurried into the room. 

“What’s happening?” Cassian demanded, his hand clutching Jyn’s and his eyes firmly fixed on her still figure.

Neither the doctor nor the droid had time to answer before, with an audible intake of breath, Jyn opened her eyes.

For a moment all Cassian could do was hold Jyn’s hand tighter as the droid and the doctor bustled around them. Jyn’s eyes flickered around the room as if searching for something familiar. Cassian was afraid to move, afraid that, after everything she had been through, he would do or say the wrong thing and she would break in front of him.

Finally he found his voice. “Jyn?”

When the green of her gaze met his Cassian nearly sobbed in relief. Despite everything she was alive and awake. The images of her tortured body hanging limp at Lithrol’s mercy – the same images that had haunted his waking moments and made sleep not only impossible but unimaginable – retreated from where they had been so ever-present for the past three days to below the surface of his mind. 

“Jyn.” This time when he said her name, his voice breaking around the single syllable, it was a prayer of thanks.

For a moment he was answered simply with silence. It was only as her eyes remained blank that Cassian began to feel something might be wrong.

“Where am I?” Her voice was hoarse and weak.

“You’re back on Hoth,” the doctor – Cassian wished he could remember her name but, truth to tell, he hadn’t been paying much attention when they had been introduced – told her. “Have been for three days.”

Jyn looked around the room again. “Hoth?”

Cassian nodded and the 2-1B droid hummed as it fiddled with the medical equipment.

“What-“ an expression of pain crossed Jyn’s face. Instinctively Cassian sat closer but her fingers remained limp in his grasp. “What happened?”

The doctor turned back to Jyn. “It’s natural to be a bit muddled, dear,” - Cassian flinched at the pet name, but Jyn didn’t react. “What you went through – well we should thank the Force you’re alive.” Cassian couldn’t agree more, but Jyn didn’t seem calmed by the statement. If anything she was more upset, the beeping from the monitor increasing speed.

“What are you talking about? What’s going one?” The first two questions had been directed at the doctor but at the last Jyn turned to Cassian, desperation and fear coloring her voice and breaking his heart, although not nearly as much as her next words did. 

“Who are you?”

Cassian stared at her in helpless horror. Jyn was visibly panicking now. She had pushed herself to sitting, despite the way her breath caught at the pain she must be causing herself, and her wide eyes flicked from Cassian’s to the droid and the near human, then back again.

“Jyn-“

“Stop saying my name like that!”

With that Jyn bolted. Ripping electrodes and monitors from her skin her bare feet hit the ground and she ran, her legs somehow managing to support her as she raced for the door. 

“Please stop. You have not been released yet,” the 2-1B intoned just before Jyn knocked it out of the way. She was though the door before Cassian could reach her and her cry echoed through the hallway by the time he burst into the corridor. 

Kay had knocked Jyn flat on her back and was looking down at her from his full height. “You are being helped, Jyn Erso. Please do not resist.”


	2. I Am the One Who Cares

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cassian and Jyn must adjust to their new reality.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am the one who knows you,  
> I am the one who cares,  
> I am the one who's always been there.  
> I am the one who's helped you,  
> And if you think that  
> I just don't give a damn,  
> Then you just don't know who I am.

Cassian sank, wide eyed, into a chair in the small medical office. They had been forced to sedate Jyn and, as the medical droids conducted tests and scans, Cassian had been pulled - for the first time since returning to Hoth - away from Jyn. 

The doctor - Dr. Owlen, according to the badge resting on her desk - sat calmly, but her eyes were sad. 

“Amnesia?”

Dr. Owlen nodded. “The drug seems to have created a block in the part of the brain that accesses long term memories. There are one or two documented cases of this occurring when the two drugs in question are mixed.”

Running a shaking hand through his hair, Cassian tried to concentrate on the doctor’s words.

“We suspect the reason she is alive at all is that the Skirtopanol had already been in her system for some time, and had therefore dissipated at least somewhat before mixing with the Lotiramine. Had she not held out as long as she did, she certainly would have died. We should be grateful if the only side effect experienced is memory loss.”

Grateful. The word taunted Cassian. He should be grateful for the blank stare Jyn had given him in medbay, grateful than when she woke up she would have no knowledge of who he was, or what she was to him. Grateful.

“How much will she remember?” his quiet voice was somehow both clear and far away.

Dr. Owlen shook her head. “There’s no way of knowing, I’m afraid, until she wakes up. Since you were with her the first time, I suggest you be with her when she comes out of it again, however, I must warn you not to present her with too much information at once. As I said, it will be miraculous if memory loss is the only result of these drugs, and we cannot be sure that too much information won’t send her into some sort of mental overload. Before I allow you to see her again, I will need your word that you will share information with her only in increments. For her own safety.”

Cassian nodded and gave his word, the overwhelming need to protect Jyn outweighing even his desperate need for her to know him. He knew, even as he was ushered out of the office and through the halls of medbay - past Bodhi and Baze’s confused faces and Chirrut’s calmly downcast one - and into Jyn’s room, that he would happily rip his own heart out to insure her safety. It was what she had done for him and it was what he was about to do for her. 

******

Dull pain radiated through Jyn’s entire body. _Force, what had happened to her?_ She could feel the pull of healing wounds, several of them, stretching across her ribs, her stomach, her arms. Cuts made with a blade, unless she missed her mark, and she had enough experience with battle wounds that she doubted she did. 

She thought for a moment, casting her mind about, trying to remember how she had gotten these wounds. Her pain went deeper than her injuries, though. Pain burrowed into the marrow of her bones, as if it had become one with her being. She felt as though she had been trampled by a herd of stampeding Fathiers. _What could have put her in this much pain?_

With a groan she forced her eyes open. The light made her skull feel as though it would burst open, but she pushed the pain away and concentrated on what she saw.

White lights. Medical instruments. A ceiling craved of... ice? 

“Jyn?” The voice was rough and tentative and her eyes flicked to its source. 

He was leaned over in a chair, his elbows on his knees as if his head had just been in his hands, but now he looked up at her with tortured eyes that make her breath catch in her throat, although she couldn’t say why. Maybe because of how tired and broken he looked. Maybe because of something else.

“Jyn, do you know where you are?”

She’d seen him before, she realized. She’d woken up in this room once already. 

“Hoth,” she croaked, remembering the woman’s words. She was surprised by how hoarse her voice was and she glanced around, spotting a cup on the bedside table. Her hands shook more than she thought reasonable when she raised the glass to her lips.

The man with tousled hair and an unshaven face watched her and waited for her to finish drinking. Jyn thought she saw his weight shift forward slightly, as if moving to help her, but when she glanced at him he was holding himself so perfectly still she was sure she must have imagined it.

Once she’d set the glass down he spoke again. “That’s right,” his voice was controlled, but she could almost feel how hard he had to try to keep it that way, though for the life of her Jyn couldn’t imagine why. “Do you know what you’re doing here?”

It was only as she wondered why he was asking her such strange questions that she realized she couldn't remember what she was doing there - that she couldn't remember much of anything.

Panic and anger flared in equal measure. “What did you do to me?” she spat, pushing herself to sitting despite the sharp cry of pain the movement threatened to elect from her. She bit the sound down.

The man half stood from his chair, her motion prompting him, but he stayed bent, hands out, as if trying not to frighten her.

“Jyn-” 

“How do you know my name? Who are you?” 

“Jyn-” 

“Why can’t I remember anything?!” Her volume had been steadily rising, but the horror that had leaked into the man’s eyes stopped her. 

She shook her head, trying to clear it. The way the world tilted and spun dangerously about her quickly told her that was not a good idea. “I’m getting out of here. This is crazy.” She pushed herself forward on the bed, but a strong set of hands caught her shoulders and gently but firmly held her back.

“Jyn, no. Listen to me. Please, you have to listen.” The desperation in the man’s voice caught Jyn off guard, enough, at least, so that she stilled under his touch. “They wanted to restrain you. They wanted to restrain you and keep you sedated. I told them I wouldn’t let them, that you wouldn’t want to wake up in handcuffs, but if you fight me now there won’t be anything I can do.” His voice grew quiet, pleading. “Please, Jyn. Trust me.”

After a moment Jyn relented and leaned back against the wall. She told herself she did it because the pain was making it difficult to support herself. It definitely wasn’t because of the look in this handsome stranger’s eyes. 

“You’re Alliance, aren’t you?” she asked, taking in his uniform as the man settled back into his chair.

The man nodded, exhaustion filling his face and voice once more. “Yes.”

“What’s your name?”

He tried to hide the look from her, but she could see in his shadowed eyes that the question hut him more than it should. “Cassian,” he sighed. 

“You’re a spy,” she noted, and he nodded, his brow furrowing. Saw had taken her to a few meeting with the Alliance before the Partisans had split from the Alliance. He had schooled her on the rankings and symbols within their numbers and he had made sure - 

_Saw._

“How did you know that?” Cassian demanded.

Jyn didn’t look at him, focusing instead on trying to catch hold of the memories that slipped beneath the surface of her mind. It was harder than catching wet Frella fish. “Saw Gerrera taught me.”

“You remember Gerrera?”

She nodded. “Yes.” She looked up at him. “Where is Saw?” 

There was a flicker of something on Cassian’s face and it infuriated Jyn that she didn’t know what it was.

“He’s not here. You joined the rebellion about a year ago.”

There was a moment of silence as Jyn processed this information. It didn’t seem likely that she had left Saw and joined the rebellion, but she didn’t seem to be able to remember much beyond her first few years with Saw. What could have happened in that time? What could have lead her here? What could have made a Rebel spy sit beside her bed with eyes that looked as though his world had been taken away from him? 

She could feel her breathing hitch in her chest as sheer, overwhelming terror began to set it at the realization that she couldn’t remember anything. Each breath was painful - she suspected she had at least two bruised ribs - but she concentrated on the pain, letting the sharp daggers that filled her chest with each inhale take over her body and mind, distracting her from everything else.

When she allowed herself to look at the man - _Cassian_ \- again, she was shocked at his sadness and pain. 

“You want me to remember you,” she murmured, an indescribable emptiness filling her chest, “but I don’t. Why don’t I remember you?”

******

Four days after she woke Jyn was discharged from medbay. It had been four days of hell for Cassian. Four days of empty eyes without a spark of recognition as Cassian thought through every word he uttered, terrified as he was that he would say the wrong thing, tell her too much too fast, and Jyn would relapse. Four days of doctors and medical droids and Dravin breathing down his neck. Four days of crushing guilt and a feeling of being so lost that even if he had left the medical bay he doubted he would be able to find his way to the mess, let alone the quarters he had shared with Jyn before this horror began, despite the murmured suggestions of rest Bodhi and the others made with sad, hopeless eyes. 

And five nights of images of Jyn chained to a ceiling, thrashing and screaming in pain, filling his mind every time he was unable to fight off sleep for a moment longer, and relenting only when he woke to the new reality of blank, uncomprehending eyes and the knowledge that what Lithrol had left him was a greater torture than even he could have devised. 

While Cassian hadn’t left the medbay, he had forced himself from Jyn’s bedside. Dr. Owlen had advised against sharing the details of Jyn and Cassian’s relationship with Jyn, and even without her medical advice Cassian would have agreed. Jyn, backed into a corner by her own mind, would lash out in rabid anger, poorly disguising the fear she felt. She had pulled needles from her arm twice and attacked Leia's protocol droid with a scalpel - an act C3PO had informed her was most uncalled for - once.

Bodhi seemed to be able to calm her a bit, mostly by telling meaningless stories of mess hall squabbles and their continued attempts to play tricks on the Skywalker boy. Jyn seemed to drink these stories in. Cassian suspected that these acts, more so than any other information, gave Jyn a tether to the world she once inhabited. In time, maybe, she would begin to use these strings to rebuild her memory. 

Baze often sat and listened, chuckling along while hiding the way his eyes grew sad at Jyn’s silence as best he could, but Churet was no longer invited. His calm resignation seemed to infuriate Jyn, and Cassian couldn’t say he blamed her. He had already yelled at the blind man twice, and when Jyn’s eyes, still sharp despite not understanding what, exactly, they were looking for, noticed the fresh bandages on his hands, Cassian had to lie - yet again - rather than admit he had punched a wall until they bled.

Beyond the obvious it was the lying that tortured Cassian most. _You can’t tell her this. She can’t know that._ Part of him just wanted to hide, from her empty eyes, from her questions, from all of it. It would be better, he thought, than facing the reality that not only did Jyn - _his Jyn_ \- not know him, but he couldn’t let her know him, either.

Not yet. Not now. And perhaps - although he pushed this thought so violently away that it only bubbled to the surface in his nightmares - not ever.

Jyn had been released. Her wounds were mostly healed - at least those that could be - and Dr. Owlen suggested it would be good to have some sort of normalcy. Jyn pointed out in a cold, clipped tone that she had not lost with her memory, that she had no idea what normalcy was. 

Despite this, Jyn seemed glad to be able to walk out of medby on her own two feet. A miracle in and of itself, Cassian was reminded as he met her at the medbay doors. The feeling of her body, limp and lifeless, in his arms hadn’t left him.

Cassian had offered to walk Jyn to her room when he realized with a jolt that was quickly becoming a sickeningly familiar feeling that she didn't know where it was. 

“Ready?” He asked. She nodded and he did his best to ignore the mistrust in her eyes. She thought she was hiding it. She didn't realize how easily Cassian could read her. 

They walked together through the halls of Eco Base for the first time since returning home. Cassian pointed out a few of the more important landmarks and ignored both Jyn’s silence and the eyes that followed them. 

Caprian Solo passed them with a quiet, “Hey, kid. Glad you’re up and about,” but otherwise they were left alone.

“And these are your quarters,” he told her, entering in the familiar door code. “Our quarters,” he amended quietly as the door slid open. 

Their things were as they had left them. Cassian’s coats hung neatly in the wardrobe, Jyn's papers strewn across the table, their bed hastily made. 

The sight of it made Cassian want to punch another wall. 

Out of the corner of his eye he watched Jyn, praying to the Force that he might see some spark of recognition. She took a few steps into the room, looking around.

“These are _our_ quarters?” she asked, an odd tone coloring her voice.

Cassian nodded. “Yes.”

“We share quarters. So are we...” She trailed off.

Cassian knew this question would come eventually and he knew what his answer had to be. Dr. Owlen had told him as much. 

“No,” he told her, ignoring the way his heart squeezed around the world. “Space is tight on Hoth. Almost everyone shares.”

Jyn seemed to accept this and sank wearily down onto the bed, drained by even the short walk from medbay. 

“So we’re... friends?” she asked, not looking at him, fiddling instead with the blaster that sat on the shelf next to the bed. While the blaster had once been Cassian’s it now belonged to Jyn and her fingers seemed to know it, even if her mind did not. 

“Yes,” Cassian agreed, surprised that she had not realized at least this much in all the hours he had spent by her side. Jyn had been cold and removed while still under the medical droids’ care. Cassian had done his best to brush it off. She couldn’t remember anything. She was overwhelmed. She was frightened.

But after seeing her with Bodhi he had begun to wonder if maybe it was him that made her shutter herself off. He was a stranger in a spy’s uniform, after all. Could he really blame her?

“I don’t get the feeling I’ve ever had many friends,” Jyn murmured, surprising Cassian with the confession. She looked up and her eyes finally found his. “Can I trust you?”

Cassian should have been used to the sensation of his heart breaking by now. In fact, he didn’t think there was much left of him to break at this point. But Jyn’s words proved him wrong as he felt himself shatter once again.

He blinked, praying that his eyes were clear and praying that Jyn could hear the truth and sincerity in his voice.

“ _Yes._ ”

******

Jyn lay awake in an unfamiliar room, staring at an unfamiliar ceiling, listening to the unfamiliar sounds of Cassian’s breathing.

He had offered to sleep on the floor and, despite the overwhelming suspicion that this was not their usual sleeping arrangement, she had agreed without a word of protest. She barely trusted the Alliance, let alone a Rebel spy.

And yet, she couldn’t help thinking, she often caught herself wanting to trust him. He had calmed her when she woke in the medical bay, had stayed by her side and had been the quiet voice keeping her from attacking every moving thing in sight with nothing but her bare hands. He had answered her questions patiently, and continued to do his best to hide the pain she knew she was causing him. 

Perhaps more surprising than all of this was that it hurt her to cause him pain.

Jyn’s thoughts wandered.

She could leave. Try and find Saw. Look for her father. But she must have left Saw for a reason. Must have joined the Rebellion for a reason. The pilot - Bodhi - told her bits and pieces about the missions and the people the Alliance helped. Baze chimed in occasionally with a word or two and even Chirrut - who had come to visit her this afternoon and who had turned out not to be so bad after all -made it seem like a good thing. 

But she couldn’t help but wonder, as she lay awake, if perhaps the reason she had decided to join the Rebellion wasn’t for Saw or her father or even the mission of the Rebellion itself, really. Maybe, just maybe, she had joined for the people she had met here.

The change in Cassian’s breath startled Jyn out of her thoughts. It had been peaceful, but now it caught, harsh in his throat, as he shifted restlessly under his blanket. Another gasp rattled in his chest and Jyn lay frozen, listening as his breathing turned to muttered words. 

“No. No. Please, no. Jyn!”

Cassian seemed to choke on her name and in the same moment he was awake. In the dark she could see him push himself onto his elbow, his breathing still ragged as if he had been running. Towards or away from something she didn’t know.

Shakily he ran a hand over his face and let out another breath. He glanced towards her, as if checking to see that she was still there - still in one piece - and Jyn shut her eyes, not wanting him to know that she had heard him. After another moment she heard Cassian shift as he lay down again. 

Quiet filled the room once more, punctuated only with the distant beeping of droids and the soft, constant whirring of the generators that kept the air slightly less than frigid. She knew Cassian wasn’t asleep and she couldn’t help but wonder what he had seen in his dreams. He hadn’t told her when she’d asked how she had lost her memory, but she could tell from his eyes and her lingering injuries that it had been bad. Very bad. 

Jyn couldn’t remember much. Bits and pieces of her time with Saw, but nothing past her thirteenth birthday or so. Even still, she knew that after her parents had been taken from her she hadn’t seen much love or comfort. Not in the way Bodhi smiled when he told her about their pranks or in the way Baze patted her shoulder heavily or even in the way Chirrut seemed to regard her with calm, unseeing understanding.

And Jyn was quite convinced that she had never know anyone, besides perhaps her parents, who would wake in the middle of the night crying out for her, unable to calm themselves until they had checked to see that she was there, safe and, if not whole, at the very least alive.

Jyn couldn’t remember why she joined the Alliance. But, she thought, as she stared up at an unfamiliar ceiling in an unfamiliar room, she was beginning to think that she would stay for the people she had met there.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for continuing to read!! This chapter is a little shorter, but I wanted to get it posted for you all.
> 
> I am quite serious when I say this chapter only got written because one person took the time to leave me a very thoughtful and encouraging note. 
> 
> Leave a comment and let me know what you think!! 
> 
> I could use the help on the next chapter...
> 
> -or-
> 
> Come say hi to me on [Tumblr](http://wearesuchstuff1.tumblr.com/) !!
> 
> Unfortunately I do not own Star Wars or Rogue One.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading!! I am working on the next chapter, but words of encouragement always help. Leave a comment and let me know what you think!!
> 
> Come say hi to me on [Tumblr](http://wearesuchstuff1.tumblr.com/)!!
> 
> Unfortunately I do not own Star Wars or Rogue One.


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